US Judge Rules Against Mark Meadows in Bid to Put an Immediate Stop on His Georgia Criminal Case
A federal judge on Wednesday denied an emergency motion by Mark Meadows to postpone criminal proceedings against him in the Georgia election-racketeering case.
Meadows, the former White House chief of staff to then-President Donald Trump, had unsuccessfully sought to remove his Georgia charges to federal court, which was denied last week.
In an order issued on Friday denying Meadows' effort to remove to the case from state to federal court, U.S. District Court Judge Steve Jones' said he would not "turn a blind eye to express constitutional power granted to the States to determine their election procedures."
Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis charged Meadows alongside Trump and 17 others last month in a sweeping state racketeering case and has consistently said she intends to try all of the co-defendants together in state court. Meadows is charged on two counts in the case: racketeering and solicitation of violation of oath by a public officer.
Meadows' effort to remove his case to federal court had centered on claims that his activities were conducted as part of his duties as chief of staff. Georgia prosecutors say that Meadows went beyond that, and they cite his work arranging Trump's phone call where the president pressured Georgia's Republican Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger to "find 11,780 votes," enough to overturn Joe Biden's victory in the state.
In his order Friday, Jones ruled that Meadows’ "alleged association with post-election activities was not related to his role as White House Chief of Staff or his executive branch authority."
Meadows filed an appeal on Jones' decision with the Atlanta-based 11th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals. On Monday, he also filed an emergency motion with Jones seeking to stay, or postpone, the criminal proceedings while he pursues that appeal.
In his order Wednesday denying Meadows'
effort to stay the proceedings while the appeal moves forward, Jones
wrote that Meadows "has shown no likelihood or prevailing on the merits
of his appeal" and that "the public interest...would not be served by
issuing an emergency stay of the
remand order."
Meadows' request for an emergency stay in his Georgia case before the 11th Circuit remains pending, with the court's clerk ordering up an expedited briefing schedule and a response due from Willis by noon EST Wednesday.
Both the Fulton County district attorney and lawyers for the former White House chief of staff were also told to separately address a key question surrounding whether under federal law the person seeking the removal of a criminal case from state into federal court must be a current federal official, rather than a former one. Those briefs are due by 5 p.m. EST Wednesday.
As Meadows' case plays out, four other co-defendants have already asked to take their cases to federal court too, with hearings before the same judge scheduled for Sept. 18 and Sept. 20.
They include requests by Trump's then-Justice Department loyalist Jeffrey Clark and three of the allegedly "fraudulent" electors: Cathy Latham, the former head of the Republican party in rural Coffee County; David Shafer, an ex-state senator and former chair of the state GOP; and Shawn Still, a state senator.
Jones wrote in his earlier ruling that his decision not to allow Meadows to remove his case to federal court "does not, at this time, have any effect on the outcome of the other co-defendants who have filed notices of removal of the criminal prosecution against them."
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